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It is an "amazing plant" that produces "hypnotic effects", according to online testimonials. Some people who have ingested or inhaled smoke say that it has given them a mild effect, similar to that of marijuana.
Today, scientists have weighed their weight. In experiments with more than 100 mice, they discovered that chemicals in the liver were four of the same key effects as THC, the main psychoactive ingredient in marijuana.
One hour after injection of the experimental chemicals, the mice entered a trance state, lost some of their ability to move, became less sensitive to pain and experienced a drop in body temperature, according to a study published this week in the journal Progress of Science.
Scientists were only "moderately powerful", so do not expect hepatic to be a threat to the popularity of marijuana as a recreational drug.
But this relative weakness can actually be its strength. Because hepatic chemicals provide some of the same biological benefits as THC with fewer psychoactive side effects, it has the potential to be more useful as a drug, said the authors. of the study.
THC, or tetrahydrocannabinol, was isolated and synthesized for the first time in 1964 by the Israeli organic chemist Raphael Mechoulam. This opened the way for scientists to study how canabinnoids interact with the human body and allowed Mechoulam to discover that the brain produces its own cannabinoid compound. He called it anandamide, in reference to ananda, the Sanskrit word meaning happiness.
Thirty years later, in 1994, Japanese phytochemist Yoshinori Asakawa identified a related substance in the liver. Radula perrottetii. He called it perrottetinene, or PET, and was later found in two other hepatic species.
The researchers who conducted the new study are the first to study the structure and effects of PET.
When they administered the PET compounds to the mice, they observed several familiar behaviors. The animals had trouble keeping their balance on a slowly rotating rod (the equivalent of a rodent of a treadmill). They did not feel pain immediately after being placed on a hot plate. And when their forelegs were stalled on a bar, they did not immediately readjust to a more comfortable position.
In other experiments, the researchers tested the PET to see what it would do in the brain. They discovered that the compounds act on some of the same THC cannabinoid receptors. But researchers were surprised to find that, unlike THC, PET reduced the level of chemicals called prostaglandins that can cause harmful inflammation.
For Jürg Gertsch, neuroscientist at the University of Bern in Switzerland and lead author of the study, the most remarkable result of this work is that PET "differs from THC in a way that could be much less problematic in terms of 'harmful central effects'.
Mechulam, who was not involved in the study, nodded. The discovery of a new alternative to THC "opens up the possibilities of new drugs," he said.
But that does not mean it will be easy. This hepatic species only grows in Japan, New Zealand and Costa Rica, and Gertsch acknowledged that its cultivation can "be a challenge" because it breeds without seeds.
Gertsch is said to be astonished to find that "nature produces psychoactive cannabinoids only in two plant species separated by 300 million years of evolution".
He added that the pharmaceutical promise of PET could raise the profile of bryophytes, the under-appreciated group of plants that includes liverworts and mosses. So far, he said, they have been "somewhat neglected in terms of bioprospecting," a term used for research on organisms that may have medicinal value.
"The fact that liverworts can generate natural products relevant to humans is an excellent example" of the importance of the field, he said.
Tarnopolsky is a special envoy.
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